E-Textile Workspacehttp://v2.nl
The E-Textile Workspace aims to offer an informal setting for both critical discussion around&about wearables, and for hands-on work on individual projects. It aims to open a space where practice is intertwined with knowledge sharing, feedback exchange among the invited participants – members of the wearable community in The Netherlands – and with critical reflection on the state-of-the-art in wearable technology. This page displays a collection of all the documented material that was generated during the various sessions.
daily12009-10-12T10:13:22Z

Explaining See-Thru-Mehttp://v2.nl/files/2009/lab/e-textile-workspace-photos/meg_see-thru-me.jpg
Meg Grant explains her See-Thru-Me projectNo publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.2009-12-15T15:23:18ZImageWearables and data visualisationhttp://v2.nl/archive/articles/wearables-and-data-visualisation
A report by Danielle Roberts of the meeting “Wearables and data visualisation” which took place at V2_ on 13 June 2013.When preparing the meeting Danielle noticed that there are a lot of wearable viz that use knitting. We discussed why this is so. Data is logically related to patterns. Technically the Brother machines enable you to make your own patterns and connect them to an Arduino which can get input from a data stream. A drawback is that it can’t be live for most streams as the machine is too slow. We looked at the Neuro-knitting project and wondered if this is the real brainwave data? How close is the link to the actual data?

What is data visualisation as opposed to data logging for example? Beam gave a clear explanation. Numbers are represented in a way that humans can understand. An RGB image is actually numbers transformed into colours. Our brain is the best data visualiser/interpreter. It simplifies the complex reality into something humans can grasp. So simplification is another essential. But it can easily become reduction. With reduction people lose the freedom to interpret all the layers of meaning. To get meaning from data combination of different sources and colourations between these sets is key.

Why is so many data on clothing static? To have dynamic data you need to work with electronics in clothing. As yet there is no fibre that can act as a carrier of information. Nano technology will be able to do so.

Maybe wearables are more suitable for data collection and screens more for displaying, Meg wondered? Screens are especially useful when looking back at collected data. And we all now carry our own personal screen with us in form of our Smartphone. Despite the drawbacks displaying data on you body can be significant Anja argued. Like people walking around with a sandwich board the wearer becomes part of the information. Or the funny guy at a party wearing a t-shirt with some crazy text on it. You can communicate about it. It can be seen as an extension. On the other hand part of your own identity is lost in transmitting the information.

Textile has a history as information carrier. Think about traditional embroidery to tell a story. And the use of colours and special gowns in different religions. This however has little relation to what we call data today. Data visualisation deals with Big data where data sets are combined, correlated and represented so we can derive meaning from them.

We’re still telling stories with data. This can take the form of life-logging. Ricardo’s Rambler shoe can be classified as a life-logging device. You can trace back your life from the track you’ve walked and share it on social media. Memoto is a company dedicated to life logging. Here too the device only captures images and GPS coordinates and the story is build in the database on screen.

Beam showed his brand new wearable that visualises space data from the sun. This is space data we can relate to. With other space data the connection is too thin and we lose interest. This wearable is a good example of simplifying a complex phenomenon, solar flares into an appealing visualisation that is dynamic but not changing too fast.

Danielle demoed an example of a wearable as a data collector. The True-Sense kit is a tiny bio sensor that can capture posture, EMG, EOG, EEG and Electrosmog. It can capture in real-time and log data. Brainwaves during sleep and meditation, activity, heart-rate, etc. All for €35. We are all very enthusiastic about it and will be organising a hands on meeting around it to explore its possibilities.

]]>No publisherArie AltenaThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.data visualisationdata visualizationdata-knittinge-textile workspacereportwearable technologywearables2013-07-08T15:20:00ZPage[Outside V2_] The eTextiles Summer Camp 2013, Call for eTextiles Practitionershttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/the-etextiles-summer-camp-2013-call-for-etextiles-practitioners
The eTextiles Summer Camp is a five day event that brings together expert practitioners of eTextiles and Soft Circuitry in one place to share their knowledge and skills through hands-on workshops, and facilitate discussions around their practices. We are looking for makers, designers, engineers and artists, who work in the field of eTextiles and soft circuitry to participate.The first Summer Camp was held in 2011 in Borås Sweden, with 20 experts. This year, the second edition of the eTextiles Summer Camp is planned from 17th to 21st of July in Poncé sur le Loir, France, hosted by Paillard Centre d’Art Contemporain & Résidence d’Artistes.

Theme

The E-textile Summer Camp’s 2013 theme will be Soft + Slow Electronics. Many of us as engineers, designers and artists are working with soft materials such as textiles and paper, exploring the potential of soft, malleable and flexible electronics. Our practices often involve techniques that require intensive hand work, often resulting in long production processes. Some of the techniques we employ are almost archaic, but because we see value in making our own materials in our own ways, old-fashioned and slow techniques often come into play. We propose to see these practices as "slow", rather than "time consuming".

In today’s society "slowness" has gained positive connotation and acknowledgement through movements like Slow Food, Slow Cities and Slow Design Principles. These movements not only embrace the amounts of physical time consumed in a process, but also the social and cultural impacts resulting from slow processes.

During the Summer Camp, we propose a celebration of slowness within soft electronics practices. We will look at techniques that take time to master and accomplish with skill, such as weaving, paper making, origami folding, pleating, embroidery, crochet, block printing and so on. Together we will explore what values slowness adds to our practices, and what values our practices contribute to society.

How to participate

Around 20-30 eTextiles practitioners from around the world can participate in this event. The application deadline is May 15th 2013. Visit etextile-summercamp.org for the application form and detailed info.

Please note that the eTextile Summer Camp is intended for eTextile practitioners. If you are interested in eTextiles and seeking an introduction to the field, the content of the event is not suitable for you.

]]>No publisherJan MiskerThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.e-textile workspaceeTextileworkshop2013-05-06T09:40:00ZNews ItemE-Textile Wastehttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/e-textile-waste
This months's eTextile workspace started out with three presentations around the topic of recycling textiles and e-waste. Producers of eTextiles already encounter recycling problems on small scale productions of prototypes, so there should be a discussion to find recycling solutions before eTextiles and wearables start to be mass produced. Mika Satomi kicked off the evening with her observations of eTextile waste from the starting point of a single sweep under her working table, finding parts of conductive thread, soldering waste and cut-off threads. She then proposed to come up with two sets of guidelines for recycling e-waste, one for the waste that comes up during production and the other for the end of life of e-products.

Probably it is a good option to start thinking about the waste already during the design process. In the planning of projects one may be able choose to use more sustainable or at least better recyclable materials. Other considerations that one could keep in mind are the scale of the production (do we want to produce 1, 10 or 10000 pieces) and the life cycle of our product (1 or 10 years?).

Andreas Koehler presented his research regarding e-waste. E-waste is collected from the consumers, and most of it just disappears, meaning it is mainly exported to developing countries in Africa, India or China.

The trend of wearables is heading towards seamless integration of electronic parts, which in turn makes the product harder to recycle because the components need to be taken apart again. Also with eTextile products, people might have more than just one "smart shirt" while they still will only have one phone or computer.

There is no recycling industry for eTextile products yet. The textile recyclers do not feel responsible and neither do the e-waste recyclers. We need a vision for waste prevention and implement it before eTextiles become a mass product.

Marina Toeters showed us her research about the complex textile production cycle. How are materials harvested, processed, marketed, sold, washed, recycled? In every step of the way some companies have already started finding better and less harmful processes. For example consumers are being awarded for bringing back old garments with credit for buying new ones, or designers intentionally make clothing that can be easily taken apart for recycling. In general textile fibers are often recycled, but when adding metals to fibers for conductivity, the fibers become less valuable for textile recycling purposes.

So the presentations lead to a discusison about what the eTextile community can do:

Materials

Andreas stated that the specific materials used for a lot of e-products are still not fully known. The producers don't always give out information on the exact components of materials. Thus making it hard to know how to appropriately recycle them.

For example:

Steel is the best conductive to recycle, because it's magnetic and can be seperated easily from other material.

Silver is quite bio-compatible, but many toxins are used in the mining process. The same applies to gold.

The combination of PVC and copper is harmful, because when burnt, the two materials produce dioxins.

So Andreas would like to be fed with information regarding the materials used by the eTextile workspace community. The idea was to make a database for the materials we use in our projects to collect the components of these materials. We should collect data on materials used such as the quantity, the supplier and the components.

We also should ask producers how we should recycle their materials best, so if they don't have strategies yet, we the users as a community will also bring them to think about the recycling aspect of their products.

Standardization

Standardization of products has been showing a good impact on waste numbers because repair and maintenance of these products become easier.

Durability

Most e-products are designed to fail after a short life-circle. Phones are exchanged every two years, computer batteries usually fail within the same period, so people are forced to buy new products. Is there any way to change consumer/producer habits?

Encourage Sustainable Behaviour

eTextiles could for instance help in using less energy. If we heat our clothes instead of our entire houses in winter, we could aready save a hug amount of energy.

Raise Awareness

One of the main goals is to raise awareness on the topic. An important point made was that people teaching about wearable technology and eTextiles should also incorporate the problems with recycling with their teaching. So it becomes clear that the waste problematic should be dealt with from the beginning of the learning and design process.

The Bigger Picture

We should not only be thinking small-scale. Dealing with eTextile waste is not only about taking apart our materials into components. Try to think like Patagonia, the clothing company that takes back the garments and returns you credit for buying new clothes. Or in a similar way like bringing back the PET-bottles to the supermarket. There could be a system rewarding users in either monetary or a fun way to bring back waste material to the producers. There are already some european directives extending the producers responsability of materials also to their recycling, so the problem of waste is already being incorporated in big scale production.

The Contest

Beam proposed to do an open contest with the theme of eTextile waste.

The goal would be to design a garment (e.g. a skirt) that can do pollution sensing using a microcontroller. Everyone taking part designs their own garment. In the end the projects will be evaluated in terms of recyclability, sustainability and harmfulness to the environment. This way we will gain some insight in what materials are better to be used, or better to be recycled to leave the smallest possible ecological footprint.

Mika, Piem and Andreas will also consider to organize a hands-on workshop to further explore 'best practice' in e-waste.

Participants

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.e-textile workspacerecyclingsustainabilitywaste2012-06-26T08:55:00ZNews ItemBeta Textileshttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/beta-textiles
Beta Textiles is the notion that textiles do not only consist of their material shape, but are also defined by some sort of code like knitting or weaving patterns. And if you consider textiles as code, could Open Source philosophy apply to the textile itself? Thursday April 12th, we had an E-Textile Workspace edition about Beta Textiles. This topic evolved from the collaboration within the dutch CRISP network on Smart Textile Services. Eventually, V2_ will organize a hands-on workshop and an Artist-in-Residency around Beta Textiles.

Introduction Beta Textiles

We had a few questions prepared as starting point for the discussion.

How does the promise of 3D printing (design at home, send to print, reduce ecological footprint) apply to textiles?

Crowdsourcing designs (open up a famous design and modify it). Would this result in innovative textiles?

How would Open Source textiles have an impact on the textile industry and production facilities?

Is Open Source textile exciting at all? Would it 'work'? Can we expect Pattern Piracy?

The evening mostly focused on defining what we all understand by Beta Textiles. Eventually, this common understanding should lead to an Artist-in-Residency proposal within the CRISP framework.

CRISP/RESIDENCY

General Development Goal

The concept of Beta Textiles is somewhat parallel to the idea of beta software. The intended project of a conceptualization of Beta Textiles is located between the fields of industrialization, design, innovation and art.

Most artists start out with making one single prototype that serves as a first tryout. We (the CRISP Smart Textiles consortium) on the other hand want to be able to produce in larger quantities/small series. So the goal is to evolve a certain textile from a single prototype into a production sample that can be modified, tweaked, dispersed, or mass-produced. This should apply not only to the industry. The idea is for many people in the community to work on it, use it, change it and apply it in different applications.

Possibly we cannot academically use a direct comparison between beta textiles and beta software, because software is something binary, only consisting of 0s and 1s, while textile is a real tactile material that can have countless properties. Thus having an enormous impact on production machine settings, and a varying outcome of results. Specifying textile behavior will be less exact than dealing with integer numbers.

The goal of the Crisp/Residency should also be to connect artists with companies. The beta textile should be developed parallel by the artist and by the industry. The development of our Beta Textile should take place in a reciprocal process: An artist would give an impulse that is then continued by the industry, at the same time the artist continues working on the idea; at a certain point findings can be interchanged (kind of like the game "exquisite corpse", where differentiated inputs from various contributors can create a common idea).

In the end, we aim to facilitate the use of an intelligent material that is easy to handle yet multifunctional in its appliance. Like this, designers should be able to use the material in their designs easily, without having to deal with programming languages. (Like in the saying: everybody wants toast, but nobody wants a toaster.)

The advantage of collaboration between the industry and the arts is that artists can come up with unexpected prototypes, or something radical. Then he/she can challenge the industry to mass-produce or invent a method of production to realize the material/sample. When working on certain materials, the artist does not have to think mainly about the usability of the product. An artist can challenge the industry, by inventing the most impossible thing and handing it over to the industry to realize the idea.

We are aiming for a textile that can actuate or sense. We are looking for a textile that could have a certain kind of behavior. Our textile should be able to be interactively applied, its interactivity should have the ability to be changed and updated.

Accessibility

Can there be such a thing as Fablabs or copyshops for textiles? It would be nice if in the future anyone could just go to the next textile-lab and print out a sweater or a dress. We live in the age of digital dispersion. With the help of machines like the MakerBot and the Ultimaker it becomes possible for any user to make a design or use a free open source one and have it printed into a real object. The notion of Open Design would open up Beta Textiles to a wide variety of possible users and developers, a wide variation of contributions from housewives to the industry.

This leads us to another aspect of the development, which also lies in the economic future of the textile industry. Will production be moved to countries with cheaper labor workforce, or will it become a little bit more specialized on certain products for niche markets? Will the DIY community as a result get stronger, so they can influence and individualize the products they want?

Create new Links

So what is the new element that we want to introduce?

Of course we acknowledge that what we are doing might not be entirely NEW (weavers reverse-engineering patterns is common practice). Our proposition is to be innovative in intertwining this method between arts & industry. We want to find ways to really apply it in practice and find common ground, additional to methods of working and developing.

One of the main questions this evening arose from the question of what should be the definition of "technical specs" for our Beta Textile. Will it be more important to state the exact settings and possibilities of a smart textile, instead of the physical or material properties of the cloth? In any case, the specifics of a material are quite important for the industry, for industrial production.

The Meta Level

There are various levels of abstraction in textiles. If we state that there is a base level and a meta level to the textile, the base level would be something like a thread, a raw material or a cloth. The meta level would be the meaning or functionality it could have.

For example: similar to one bit, a single thread could have the same significance as a base for all kinds of different applications. A textile with a single incorporated conductive thread can serve as an antenna, a heat-pad, a connection line in a circuit, a sensor and many more. Combinations of thread can lead to higher-level products and can get even more complex, similar to higher level programming tools and applications in software.

This is all assuming you want to simply create a textile from the ground up with for example weaving or knitting. Any of these things can also be made when using embellishment techniques such as embroidery, screen printing etc, or these techniques can be used to complete a circuit made in a fabric. Alternatively the conductive thread can be a 'parasite' in a decaying textile when you use conductive thread to darn the fabric (in Dutch: stoppen, like you'd do with an old sock). Yeah, textile cyborgs!!

Context

So in the end we need to limit the context. Limit the project to one material, one method, so it doesn't get out of hand. For the V2_ residency the method should be based on knitting. Material will be produced before the residency to have something ready for the artist to use and manipulate it. We will have to invent something that people will want to COPY! So we have to make our textile interesting enough (and probably simple enough) that everybody will want to have it.

Since KOBAKANT is the most widespread and complete database on DIY techniques/materials it might be nice to seek collaboration with “How To Get What You Want”. It could be interesting to scale it up to an easy-to-use and understandable guide to “industrial manufacturing for dummies”.

Participants

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.e-textile workspaceknittingopen sourceopen workspacetextileswearable technology2012-04-18T13:15:00ZNews ItemIs Wearable Tech Just Bad Fashion?http://v2.nl/lab/blog/is-wearable-tech-just-bad-fashion
Wearable Technology is often criticized to be merely 'bad fashion'. Being on the verge of art, fashion and technology, one could argue it is therefor not real fashion. Or at least not attractive in it's design. In this e-Textile Workspace edition, we have invited nine fashion masters from ArtEZ Institute of the Arts to discuss this from a fashion point of view.Thursday March 1st 2012, we had a 'special guest' edition of our eTextile Workspace, with nine students from ArtEZ ánd seven people Skyping in from the Swedish School of Textiles, SF Fashion+Tech and elsewhere. It was very surreal to have multiple heads sitting at the meeting room table on laptop screens, with personal 'care-takers' to turn the screens towards the live audience.

Piem started with an introduction about V2_ and the wearable artworks that are produced by the Lab. She focussed on specific issues regarding presentation formats and the differences between Art and Fashion when presented on stage or during a performance. After that, all participants briefly introduced themselves. Melissa then moderated the discussion.

Here is a summary of the discussion, thanks to Meg and Evelyn for taking notes!

Initial ideas from the fashion design group

First, the group explored the overall question. We asked the participants to give an opinion on existing examples of Wearable Technology and how they feel about WT in general.

Should you approach WT as a component, or as a type of clothing? If you compare electronic components to buttons and zippers, they are not considered to stay forever as basic parts.

It seems like wearable technology is more likely to be a trend, here today gone tomorrow, rather than something in the designers' toolkit to be integrated again and again into a design.

What is the function of WT? To the fashion group it seems more logical to have an application in accessories, since these are considered more functional in themselves (reference: bags, shoes). And you don't have to change them all the time to wash.

Chargers for electronic equipment is considered functional.

"I don't need something that can DO something. It unnecessarily involves with my life. There are already too many computers around me."

Hussein Chalayan's pieces are well known, but this 'Back to the Future' style is considered a pitfall. Subtlety is the way to go.

None of the fashion students has seen any convincing piece yet.

The roles of art, fashion and technology

To better understand the matter, we shortly discussed the respective roles of art, fashion and technology.

Fashion and accessories are about creating a character, the design-process allows a lot of trials and the result is seasonable which means fast changes.

For functional fashion the esthetics stay most important, the function should make sense and the life duration of a product becomes a requirement (reference: snowboard with solar panel charger, bike with light).

Functional clothing is “in general not cool unless it becomes a trend” (reference: Nike shoes).

Art in fashion is about the concept, introducing something, the model needs to actively participate; if the smart function fails, the model should perform and save the show (reference: Hussein Chalayan).

Art criticizes and questions the audience -Design wants to come up with something useful and nice -Fashion wants to express, bring awareness and sell.

Wearable technology is about merging two worlds by creating body interfaces, textile electronics. It changes the perception on hard- and software.

Do we want wearable tech? Do we want it in fashion?

Wearable technology started with wearable computers developed at MIT and is going towards mainstream fashion; do we want this, and where to go next?

As a showpiece, yes. In daily life, no. However, there is an interesting market aspect in showpieces. How to go from stage wear to merchandized art?

Wearable technology should not require any cables (reference: “apple jacket”).

The customer (fan) can be involved in the design process (reference: control vs. niche vs. trend).

With technology, the clothing is going to have a character. This might interfere with the identity of the designer.

Does the gimmick fit function; the material gets its own life, there is a difference between a material being unpredictable or a material which you can influence (reference: color sensors which adapts to the environment through light reflections). Unpredictability is interesting, but the wearer can also get annoyed when you don't know what the dress is going to do next.

Technology is "hot" in fashion: show your laptop, phone, gadgets. But although technology is “hot” right now and everyone wants to be seen with the latest Apple device, no one wants to wear an Apple jacket.

The question is: Does it add extra value or not? Wearable Technology should be subtle, not flashy.

The function of the technology (if there is one, e.g., posture corrector) is seen to be separate from the fashion element.

This last point, function not integral to form, is seen to be a big obstacle to wearable tech. The example of solar-panel backpacks was brought up. This is potentially a really handy accessory and it's relatively easy to find a bag with solar-panels. The problem is that most of them don't fit into a fashion palette at all.

Another point raised, is that things you wear every day often already have a function. If technology adds a second function, the two can clash. An example would be a dress with solar panels to charge your devices. A dress is worn one or two times before it must be washed and a new dress (also with solar-panels?!) would be required.

Where are we now, technically?

The technical possibilities play a central role in the design-process of wearables. Wearable Technology is often developed as a 'technology-driven' piece of work, and focussed on the further development of the tech or to explore the limitations.

We can integrate light, shape and sound and develop fabrics that generate power.

Dynamics that did not exist before into textiles create new materials.

Wearable technology communicates and people start to understand how to use the new materials.

Designers inspire textile companies and should collaborate more, the lab helps to mediate between these two.

In regards to presentation is the fashion method (Photography) the best way to present WT?

Photography cannot capture all the dynamics (reference: a gimmick might need time before phase changing).

Video offers more when you want to present a transformation.

Sound can be expressed through vision and association (reference: perfume editorials).

Would you use technology to add light/sound/movement to your collection?

Having discussed the most common expressions in wearable tech, we asked the fashion students directly if they would be interested to use any of these 'usual suspects' in their future designs and collections.

What if you could have fabrics that accentuate your movements or change, depending on your mood? Or have acoustic fabrics with noise cancellation, or a REALLY GOOD working invisibility cloak/ projection dress.

When a child gets a flashy toy with light and noise, it's fun at first but after a while they'll return to the old toy that does nothing. The toy with no lights or noise is attractive because you can play with it using your own imagination.

Fashion designers don't want to have to learn to be engineers, they want to use traditional techniques (cut, sew, drape, etc) and have the technology fit that.

So we see the future as more embedded technology, i.e. cotton transistors, but we need it to be intuitive to use.

If we didn't have to worry about things not working, what would you make?

It seems that this question hadn't really be posed to the fashion students before. They feel the answer is something beautiful, not necessarily functional, like fabric that is lighter than air. The idea of a self-repairing fabric or energy-generating fabric was also exciting, but it was seen as a function adjacent to fashion and not the main focus. The main focus would still be the look and feel of the garment.

They want to start with a story to tell or a concept or a particular environment and design for that rather than starting with the technology and trying to integrate it. The idea of transformation is key to fashion concepts, so there is definitely some potential there. The fear is that things will become gimicky and too “futuristic”. But then maybe that's just the result of bad design, not necessarily the technology itself.

Fashion is focussed on change - if it's fashionable this year, it won't be fashionable next year because that's how fashion works. Also, marketability is important to the fashion industry, although the fashion students think it's more about self-expression. They see the fashion system as a means to an end. And fashion needs frontrunners who do something crazy that no one pick up until later.

Buying ever-lasting BASICS is considered an interesting idea: that you can buy one garment and change it's color at will. Or you can buy an 'upgrade', comparable to software updates.

The textile companies want to try new things, but no one asks them for it. Fashion people want to try it but they are afraid to come to the textile companies and ask.

Collaboration is key - fashion + textile designers working with engineers and textile manufacturers plus a mediator like a university or a lab.

Conclusion

So, is wearable technology just bad fashion?? At best, wearable tech is currently seen as a showpiece from which to derive more sellable works, or a performance piece, to garner attention. The students were also aware of technical limitations – wearable tech might not always work as well as we would like it to.

The agreement after this discussion is that it does not have to be bad fashion, it is up to the designer. Given the state of the technology, we are simply not there yet. On the way to innovation, failure is inevitable and that is what we see a lot nowadays. To be ready for fashion designers to work with it, smart materials should be as intuitively to handle as normal textiles. Generalizing: where artists and engineers see beauty in the challenge of experiment and research, fashion designers are more interested in the resulting looks and do not want to deal with the technological hassle. Collaboration with people from different backgrounds and education is key, provided there is clear guidance from a mediating party. And don't underestimate the value of amateurs working in the field. Amateur has it's origin in the word 'amare = to love something'. Do it because you love it! That will give you best results.

Participants

Piem Wirtz

Melissa Coleman

Meg Grant

Oscar Tomico

Kristi Kuusk

Martijn ten Bhömer

Mika Satomi

Mili Tharakan

Barbro Scholz

Mika Uehara

Evelyn Lebis

Danielle Roberts

Ricardo O'Nascimento

Simeon Morris

Barbara Langendijk

Mirjam Colombo

Hilda Wijnhoud

Stephanie Baechler

Ellis Droog

Laura de Weijer

Martine Bovee

Paulien Routs

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.e-textile workspacefashion designer2012-03-08T15:20:00ZNews ItemPerformative Wearableshttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/performative-wearables
Since wearable technology pieces are often designed to be interactive, and in most cases are presented to an audience in some sort of way, we thought it was interesting to do a thought experiment: can every ‘wearable’ be considered a performative work, and can this approach help to design and create more meaningful projects? When Valerie Lamontagne was 'researcher-in-residence' at V2_Lab, we dedicated two editions of the eTextile Workspace to the topic of 'Performativity'. We had intense discussions, and these notes try to give an overview of what has been said and thought on February 10 and March 10, 2011. To better follow this discussion, we will define the relevant keywords first, as we understand them. In between the text, we put statements and questions for the reader. We don’t have the answers; we just want to share our thoughts with the world and tickle your brain.

Wearables

What is a ‘wearable’? We define it as 'something designed to fit the body and to stay there when you are not actively holding it' (as opposed to ‘portables’). The BODY is an essential component, a structure to hold it up, and to make a wearable ‘work’.

Statement: Wearables are intended to DO something.

This provokes the very important question: does it work?? And if not, did it fail as a wearable? (“do” can be both input and output. Input is things like energy harvesting, CO2 sensing, solar panels. Output relates to sound, light, visual change). Remark on the side, to test the definition: Is a piece of cloth still considered wearable technology if you put hundreds of LED’s on it, without including the battery? How is this different from a garment studded with Swarovski crystals?

Performance and performativity

In this context, performance is defined as an action or process of accomplishing a task, which sorts an effect to a human perceiver. How does performance relate to interaction and participation? KEYWORD: experience. Important: for who is the experience?

Performative wearables

Performative wearables are pieces of clothing that are amplifying the body, adding a question of scale or adding layers of mediation.

Statement: If it is not mainstream, it is called a wearable.

A wearable is performative if some sort of transition/transformation is taking place, during a live demonstration. The notion of ‘live demonstration’ leaves us with another issue: wearables often have multiple lives. Real time (live) demonstration is documented by video registration and professional photography, and end up being displayed in several media. Some wearables are famous as icons; most people only get to know them through visual documentation. The audience never experiences the pieces up close. Many wearables look great on pictures, but do not live up to the expectations in real life.

Question:can a wearable piece still have performative quality if it is represented on video or paper?

People like to see ‘how it works’. If you demo a work live, it can add to the appreciation to show the raw technology behind: “where’s the battery”? It might as well shatter the dream, but it contributes to the notion of something being ‘real’, another important criterion in considering performativity in wearable technology.

Nevertheless, considering the popularity even from visual documentation only, wearables have an appealing factor. Will eventual performativity come across to an audience from documentation only? If documentation is your end game, the concept should be very strong or it should simply look very good. This is a totally different exercise compared to showing an interactive/ participatory/ performative artwork.

Defining stages

Our definition of performance implies a ‘stage’ and an ‘audience’. We were trying to categorize wearables by different stages. Each stage dictates or prescribes specific properties the wearable must have. Thus different stages could bring different wearables.

Participatory (live demo, experience)

Prom dress (special events)

Red carpet (show off by celebrities)

Catwalk (fashion show, not intended to wear everyday)

Live entertainment (on stage, from distance)

Demo (in progress, plugged in)

Gallery (plugged in, don’t touch)

Film (documentary, special effect. Can be fake)

This list is ordered by ‘reality check’. Stage 1 needs to be fully operational and retard-proof to be successful, where as stage 8 can be completely fake or virtual. Again, crucial is the notion “does it work?” or “is it real”?

Observation: we do not wear wearables everyday. Why? Are wearables for special events? Are they simply a statement piece?

Performative techniques

The whole point of considering performativity and wearables as an interesting combination is because we are looking for the effect it generates.

Therefor we did a second categorization attempt, this time focused on techniques. How do different techniques make you perform differently, when implemented in a garment or costume?

Illuminated (turns you into a 2D display screen)

Shape shifting (makes you freeze)

Gesture based (interaction becomes an act)

Networked (adds a virtual stage)

Illuminated: Why wear lights?

Two reasons: Look at me! (Show off) and See me! (Functional: Don’t run me over).

On a conceptual level, illumination does not have much to offer. Truth be told, LED’s or similar are popular because it is a stable platform (nature of the technology). However: if you ask fashion designers, with little or no knowledge of the technical constraints, to include technology in their designs, they will mostly come up with “light” or “movement”. So there is some natural attraction to it.

Question: does wearing light influence the behavior of the wearer/performer?

'Barreleyes' (Dattah + Evelyn Lebis) positions the dancers in a humble position, they are only the carrier of the light source.

Question:can you ‘wear’ light as such?

For example the Chunky Moves performers do not wear LED’s, but the light is following the body with projection mapping. Thus becoming the clothing in itself. This is balancing on the borders, stretching the definition of wearable technology. It is somewhere in between second and third skin. Check also the youtube video on face projection mapping.

Statement: if something is acting as a kind of skin, it is considered a wearable.

Or in other words: is the definition of a ‘wearable’ related to the distance between technology and the body?

Shape shifting: The wearable IS the performer.

In most cases it will make you freeze, because you don’t want to disturb the fragile technology or you don’t want to withdraw the attention from the garment. The wearer becomes a live mannequin doll. Gliding scale: Who is the performer? Wearable versus wearer...

Statement: People want to touch.

People expect garments to be able to withstand a certain level of touch. They are used to clothing, so they should be able to feel it, explore it, without being anxious to ruin it. Live up to the expectations!! If you need a sign “Don’t Touch Me”, your wearable has a bad interface design. There often is a mismatch between what an audience expects and what (fragile) technology can handle.

Interesting to consider: what does “touch me” in a demonstration setting mean?

Statement: Most wearables are ugly.

If they are meant to do something, then it is about the effect. The effect should be meaningful and subtle. If the wearable is badly designed, it distracts attention. Don’t design for the sake of using lights or any other technology, but do something meaningful with it.

Conclusion

Performance and wearables are highly related, yet very difficult to define or to categorize. The main thing we would like to conclude from this discussion is that artists and designers can use performativity as a starting point for creating meaningful concepts. Tracing back from the audience to the stage to the technique to the garment itself. What story would you like to get across? Who is your target group? In what context will it be presented and what do you need to make that happen?

We believe it can be a powerful tool to start thinking from the perspective of ‘performativity’ rather then to be technology driven.

Participants

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.e-textile workspace2011-12-06T13:42:37ZNews ItemWearable Spaceshttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/wearable-spaces
The E-Textile Workspace of November 30th 2010 was organized around the subject of "Wearable Spaces". The schedule for the evening consisted of a discussion, a presentation of Nicky Assmann’s final exam project and time to discuss the participants’ own projects.Nicky Assmann showed us her research about her final exam project Between Shadow and Reflection and started the discussion about wearable spaces, with the following questions as its point of departure:

How Abstract Can We Define Wearable Spaces?

If we can see the second skin as a wearable or layer around the body then we can see the third skin as the space around us either in architecture or as the empty space or void around us. But when does an interior become a wearable exactly? Amba Molly for example designs wearable interior spaces. By using everyday familiar interior objects into a garment she takes the concept of wearable spaces very literal, in a nice way. This is actually a form of combining second and third skin wearable’s together.

Nicky Assmanns master project is related to this concept and tries to form a new space around the body with the help of foam bubbles. She found some inspiration in the project of Sam, a performer who started his interest for making huge bubbles in 1989. He holds world records for his skills by putting 50 people inside a giant bubble. Nicky is experimenting with the bubbles more as an art installation by creating a space within a space around people or forming landscapes with soap-foam. These kind of textile-like spaces might create a new way of looking at materials and textile-like structure. She presented her research on this topic during the night. There were some questions about the topic among the people present.

Examples of Wearable Spaces Projects

Christy Wright designs wearable accessories made from ceramics. With her esthetic way of looking at accessories and everyday interior objects she places the human body in wearable interiors.

Cocky Eek is teaching at the Art Science Interfaculty of the Royal Conservatory and the Royal Academy in The Hague (NL). Her classes are dealing with all sorts of lightweight and inflatable structures, looking for ways to merge the digital and physical worlds in urban surroundings and nature. She is a really good example of how to interpret wearable spaces as a wearable.

Joo Youn Paek designs wearable spaces more in a humoristic way and critiques the self-sustainable with a project that makes walking into “an amusing interactive performance”. The self-sustainable chair is a wearable commentary piece on how we balance the act of sitting with the act of walking. In her dress design she combined interior objects like a chair, and therefore the wearer is self sufficient in sitting somewhere in the big city.

Kathy Ludwig focuses more on second skin by transforming it into a third skin. Her inspiration derives from several psychological diseases that seem to take over western society like phobias and anxiety states. The skirt is constructed out of pockets and can camouflage you as a tree when lifted over the head. The skirt forms a space around the upper body, hiding you from the outer world and perhaps giving you a safer feeling.

Studio Acconci developed an architectural new space around the human body by re-interpreting the umbrella in an esthetical way. For this purpose they created a new space around the body to protect it and give shelter.

White Swan from Sil van der Woerd is a project that visualizes a dress made out of cotton candy. This experimental way of developing a dress and use it as an installation for a music video shows us how wearables can be experimental and how unexpected materials can be textile-like.

Should We Consider a Dialogue With the Space Around Us?

Sara Vrugt focuses on people stuck in interior spaces and how this meets an esthetic world. With this created third skin she designed a dance act to examine the proportions between the hatred of females among each other. This 3rd skin she developed is an interesting view on wearable spaces and creates a dialogue between the space and the wearer of it. The Veasyble Bag creates more of a space between 2 people. A kind of symbiosis membrane between two people and brings them together while at the same time protecting them from the world around them. This work shows us a connection between protection and communication. This project shows us a non dialogue with the space around the two people that are completely hidden from their surroundings.

Cinematique, a poetic dance act by illusionist Adrien Mondot tries to embed 3d sculpting in a beautiful way into a performance. The shifting boundaries between the physical and virtual seen in an audiovisual dance performance where modern dance and play are combined. Another example of a dance performance is Glow a solo work choreographed by Artistic Director Gideon Obarzanek, incorporates a real-time video landscape generated via motion tracking technology and designed by interactive software engineer Frieder Weiss. Performances alternate between dancers Kristy Ayre and Sara Black. It’s a concentrated and complex work, yet has immediate visual and visceral appeal. Choreographically, theatrically and technically, this is a refined piece. Both of these dance performances show a really beautiful and technological way of starting a dialogue between the dancer and the stage, where the dancers really have to anticipate to the created virtual space around them.

What Are the Challenges for Wearable Spaces and What Makes Them Work?

Trying to make clothing one-size-fits-all may pose a problem. The suits of the Whisper project, for example, ended up being huge on many people. But this way you do guarantee that anyone may participate. Another difficulty may occur when you try to personalize the space. In Whisper they used projections on the floor to show interpretations of the internal body. How do you make people feel that an interpretation of bio data that they cannot feel or see really is an extension of them?

Erotogod is an art installation in which the public is taken to another mythical world. The public creates its own mythical world by touching their own bodies, which triggers visuals on a screen in a disclosed space especially designed for this installation. Somehow there is a kind of erotic and scary feel to it. The body in this installation becomes an emotional surface. Melissa: I had the feeling that I as a viewer really was part of this installation. The physical feedback through vibration motors made a very clear connection between the visitor and the space.

Is it Important as a Visitor to be Part of the Wearable Space?

In Hussein Chalayan’s laser dress performance/catwalk show we can clearly see that his design for the dress was consistently based on the performance of it and how the dress should interact with the space around it. The model in de dress marvelously takes over the entire space around it by the laser technology embedded in the dress. Through this we can see a bridge between wearable spaces and performance art. Nicky argued that the audience should be part of an installation, so she tries to work on this part for her project. Melissa later added that an installation should start a dialogue with the space around it, just like a performer needs to fill the whole stage with his presence.

Participants

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.Intimate InterfacesPerformancearchitectureaugmentedbodycatwalkceramicschoreographyclothingdancediscussione-textile workspacefashion2011-01-06T13:45:00ZNews ItemTransformational Garments http://v2.nl/lab/blog/transformational-garments
The 21st of October 2010, the E-Textile group chose 'transformational garments' as starting point for discussion. Where the topic can be interpreted very literally, in the sense of transforming the shape of a wearable piece, the discussion evolved swiftly towards the question how transformation affects our body and mind.Read all e-Textile Workspace reports

To get the literal definition of transformation (Dictionary: a thorough or dramatic change in form or appearance) out of the way, the evening started with showing examples of transforming clothes.

Another angle that we took is the thought that the process of making
is transformation in itself. For example, cutting a pattern out of a flat piece of textile, then sewing the pieces together creates a 3D shape. Or programmed code to create a 3D model is used to establish a physical reproduction of an object.

Melissa points out that transformation is also about telling a story. Dress differently and be treated differently (transformation & culture). Clothing has a deeper layer, giving a signal: the mini-skirt was popular in times when the anti conception pill was invented.

Clothing and the Brain

Maybe the most interesting thought of the evening is the notion that not only the clothing itself can transform, but the clothing can also transform it's wearer. More specifically, certain things you can wear will actually change your brain.

Danielle gives the example of the human compass, or feelSpace project. This compass helps you navigate even blindfolded with help from haptic feedback. The body gets accustomed to it within a few days, and when you take it off you experience a temporary loss in sense of direction. Another example is the TomTom: you get accustomed to- and become dependent on the device quite easily. If you drive with help of a navigation system instead of training your sense of direction, it will take twice the time to get to know a new city. The good thing is that we have a choice when to use it, when to rely on it.

Nicholas Carr nicely describes this process of sacrificing human capabilities in his book "What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains". Due to use of the Internet your attention span changes, you are more easily distracted. Reading a difficult book gets more difficult, since we loose the ability to focus. In other words, the speed with which we process information has changed. In a way we become dumber as human beings, replacing bodily senses and memory skills with technology inferior to our own sensory system. But it is not merely a bad thing: we just learn different things; suitable to the times we live in. Socrates expressed the same doubts about books in his time… so this shift has taken place during all our history: talk-listen (memory storage) evolved into write-read (physical storage) evolved into digital storage where everything is 'out there' on the internet, ready to be searched. Instead of learning things by heart, we now learn how to find information.

Technology is mostly presented as enhancement, as an addition to our capabilities, where as it may be thought of as re-routing our capabilities: you win some, you loose some. Wearable technology relates to this topic if you see 'wearables' as enhancements of the human body (the cyborg thematics)... Given the previous examples, clothing is not only close to our body; it is also close to our brains. This is something to be aware of, not scared.

Showcases

A trend we see in wearable technology is the design of clothing that creates new awareness, bringing back the senses to re-establish physical relationships in answer to the virtual life. Wearables allow you to play with the borders: where ends 'yourself' and where starts the 'outside (virtual) world'.

Anja Hertenberger and Danielle Roberts explain E-pressed: a wearable piece that senses and visualizes inner states creating awareness in the wearer and in others.

Meg imagines what will happen if we are all wearing the T-shirt: we will start ignoring the signals, or get even more distressed. Awkward situations are not about the shirt, but about the people. You need to define the social context to make it work. This is true for many wearable technology designs.

Lara and Secil demonstrated their first prototypes of jewelry and accessories that are visualizing stress. Magnetic points on a servomotor will make an attached piece of jewelry twist your shirt, literally visualizing the tension in your muscles. A nice detail is that they use the Gestalt Theory for the expression of the accessories. The designs combine old knowledge with new sensor technology.

References

Participants

Melissa Coleman

Piem Wirtz

Anja Hertenberger

Meg Grant

Nicky Assman

Danielle Roberts

Michou Stek

Laura Duncker

Secil Ugur

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.biometric systemse-textile workspacememorynavigationneuroscientistperceptionsensestextilestransformation2010-11-18T15:25:00ZNews ItemDMY Berlin Reporthttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/dmy-berlin-report
June 10 2010, V2_ participated at the Maker Lab during the DMY Festival. Meg Grant, Melissa Coleman, Anja Hertenberger, Joachim Rotteveel and Piem Wirtz represented the E-Textile Workspace in Berlin.The E-Textile Workspace team was invited by the DMY organization to facilitate a workshop at the Maker Lab, a 'habitat of Open Design workstations that invite you to explore an unparalleled dimension of hands-on knowledge sharing'.

The open structure of the event stimulated various creative minds to collaborate and explore possibilities of new materials and production methods. A guerilla-weaver jumped onto our conductive thread and made us a small piece that could be used in a circuit, others were rubbing bio-plastic jelly into pieces of cloth to create lampshades out of them. The Open Design exhibition space was growing around us during the day, since the modular pieces were laser-cut at the Fablab while we were giving the workshop and explained visitors the concept and principles of wearable technology.

Since we expected our participants to be new to the field of wearable technology, we prepared a very basic E-textile kit to make a soft switch and incorporate that into a garment of choice. Preparing fifty kits in the train to Berlin raised some eyebrows, but made travel-time fly. We had a great time in sunny Berlin...

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.e-textile workspacefestivalworkshop2010-06-28T14:10:00ZNews ItemDMY Festival Berlin Invites E-Textile Workspacehttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/dmy-festival-berlin-invites-e-textile-workspace
DMY International Design Festival Berlin, 09-13 June 2010, has invited the E-Textile team to give a hands-on workshop at their Maker Lab space.Participants of the V2_ E-Textile Workspace will be submerged in the
world of wearable technology for a day. Experienced workshop leaders
will explain the aims and key concepts of the field, and assist
participants to build a simple soft interface into one of their own
existing garments. The workshop will be beginner level.

See you in Berlin?

DMY International Design Festival Berlin

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.e-textile workspacewearable technologyworkshop2010-05-19T08:30:00ZNews ItemHow to Make Textiles Movehttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/how-to-make-textiles-move
In the 5th E-Textile Workspace we focused on the question how to make textiles move. Previously, some ad hoc experimentation with Flexinol shape memory alloy was done, but we all agreed it would be interesting to see what we could come up with independently.This workspace session was more practically oriented, so there is not much discussion to be shared this time. Read previous E-Textile Workspace sessions.

The participants presented several samples during the session, trying to achieve movement with their textiles. In general, everybody achieved a certain degree of movement with their textiles/samples; the difficult part was to achieve movement in a subtle way and without too much noisy mechanics, in order to obtain a better/smoother effect.

Trained Muscle Wire

Aduen and Anouk trained a piece of muscle wire in a ceramics oven, proving that you don't have to buy pre-trained wire.

Moiré Effect

Stan was inspired by the idea of shielding yourself from the surveillance camera's that surround us everywhere. Shimmering ("moving") textile could distort the camera's, known as the Moiré effect. Depending on the quality of the used webcam and the distance towards the camera, the Moiré hoody did the trick.

Participants

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.e-textile workspace2010-05-18T14:52:57ZNews ItemWearable Technology as an Interface with Virtual Environmentshttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/wearable-technology-as-an-interface-with-virtual-environments
The 4th E-Textile Workspace took place on 24 February 2010. We were joined by two students from the Hogeschool voor de Kunsten Utrecht. Aduen Darriba and Anouk Wipprecht are working on a graduation project together that integrates wearable technology and were keen to share their discoveries, inspirations and questions with the group.Follow all Workspace results at the E-Textile Workspace collection.

Plug and Wear Textiles

In February a few participants made a combined
order from Plug and
Wear, including the Conductive Fabric Evaluation Kit. In the first part of the workspace we
ran small, informal tests on these textiles. We examined their different properties which included
different levels of resistance in different directions and varying conductivity
depending on movement and stretch in some samples.

There is also quite some interest in the
Textile Perfboard product from Plug and Wear, although we have yet to
experiment with this.

Multi-touch Film

We're very excited about DISPLAX's new
multi-touch film announced in the press earlier this month. We're hoping that V2_ can acquire a
small sample of this so that we can use it in future development and
experimentation. More links to
articles on this new technology are listed at the bottom of this page.

Can wearable technology transpose
the physical body into virtual environments?

The topic for this session was a natural
continuation from brainstorming in the
previous E-Textile Workspace.
The question: Can wearable technology transpose the physical
body into virtual environments; acted as a springboard for a broader
discussion.

One of the immediate things that come to mind
when thinking of wearable technology transposing the physical body into virtual
environments is controlling an avatar via a suit. This kind of intuitive interface ideally should not require
the user to think about the controls.
It becomes an extension of her body. However, an input device like a Wii or a mouse is much more
easily detached from the body when the user wishes to disengage from the
interface. Seamless integration
into a virtual environment by wearing a full body suit can make integration
with the real world difficult as basic real-world functions (like going to the
bathroom) become challenging!

We moved onto less cumbersome examples of
wearable technology like prosthetics, hearing aids, etc.The question remains: to what extent
people will accept more and more physically invasive technologies? At the moment, the ability to remove it
and the idea of being in control is important. But this may change in the future as history shows us that
fear of new technologies is a part of human nature. People once mistrusted cell phones and even eyeglasses, but
these are now integral to many people's lives.

Skepticism about wearable-networked
technologies and the requirement to easily remove them is rooted in issues of
privacy and ownership of personal space.
Some applications discussed by participants were RFID tracking and
avoiding security cameras.

So what is the reason for participating in
virtual worlds? A large motivation
is to escape from our real lives, either for entertainment or to be free from
physical and/or social restrictions.
Daydreaming transposes us into a virtual world as an easy escape from
reality/everyday things, but technology enables us to do this in groups. Part of the attraction of wearable,
intuitive interfaces is the idea of extending body language communication. Humans have a need to communicate
beyond the restrictions of language and in virtual environments like web-based
social networks; we try to approximate this with emoticons, symbols, typing in
capitals, etc. But body language
doesn't get filtered through the same processes as verbal expression, it goes
directly to the body, so it follows that clothing might be engineered to
express our feelings by capturing body language. Of course, participants also questioned how comfortable we
feel sharing these sub-conscious feelings in a virtual social space.

The flip side to transposing the physical body
into virtual environments is enhancing the physical body with augmented
reality. In this way, we bring the
virtual world to ourselves rather than the other way around. Perhaps then we might also feel we have
more control over the experience.

There are obvious practical uses for wearable
or body-integrated interfaces.
Task-oriented applications like those used to record movements in the
work-place can be used to analyze ergonomics, but the same technology can used
to increase efficiency with less regard for workers' well-being. When science fiction becomes science
fact, participants agreed that humans should be controlling the machines, not
vice versa!

We also decided that it doesn't really matter
if the applications are practical or not.
Perhaps what is important is making people reflect on the experience
itself.

Links and references shared by the participants

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.e-textile workspacefashioninterfaceprivacysmart clothingsoft sensorsvirtual realitywearable technology2010-03-03T08:50:00ZNews ItemWhy Wearable Technology Inspires Ushttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/why-wearable-technology-inspires-us
Third E-Textile Workspace, January 21 2010, focused on the question of why we make wearables.Follow all Workspace results at the E-Textile Workspace collection.

Main topics

The E-Textile Workspace of January 21 was organized around the subject
of "why wearables?." The session was opened with a welcoming of two visitors,
Silvia and Stoffel, who both came from the university of Florence to do a stage
and/or visit the Lab and the E-Textile Workspace. The schedule for the evening
consisted of a discussion, a materials exploration and time to work on and
discuss the participants’ own projects. The chosen material of the evening was
Shape Memory Alloy, better known as muscle wire or Nitinol, or by one of it’s
brandnames such as Flexinol or Stabinol. From earlier sessions it had become
clear that the material is a huge favorite among the participants although few
had worked with it.

The evening was started with a discussion of the topic with the
following questions as its point of departure:

What should we (as art society) accomplish with wearables?

What motivates us to make wearables?

What excites us about the medium?

What is it good at and where does it fail?

How can wearables benefit society at large?

Bringing electronic textiles to the manufacturers

As far as up-close-and-personal technology goes the most successful
technology today is mobile technology. So what will be the killer app for a
textile based technology? Obviously it is not here yet, but once a profitable
wearable has made it’s way to the general public, then the manufacturing of
conductive fabrics will no longer be a niche market. What will convince
manufacturers to jump into the gap? It seems that there are still discoveries
to be made in the best way to fuse technology and fabrics but apparently few
factories are willing to do the groundwork for this when there is not yet a
promise of certain revenue. Is it up to European manufacturers to specialize
and innovate so that they can distinguish themselves from mass-producing
textile countries such as China? The only manufacturer taking up this challenge
and simultaneously bringing it to the consumer market is currently PlugAndWear.
The question was raised if maybe PlugAndWear would be able to create a fabric
with Shape Memory Alloy as the SMA-fabric made by Grado Zero Espace is not
within the budget of students and most artists.

Perhaps textile research labs could also play a part in the development
of electronic fabrics? The process of the creation of Media Vintage (made at
V2_ Lab) was discussed where the embroidery of the touch sensitive tapestry was
executed at the Textile Lab in Tilburg. The problem that constantly arose
during the development of that piece, and thereby hampering the process, was
that the thread was not suitable for the embroidery machine. This type of
problem will often arise when using new conductive materials on machines meant
for regular threads. One participant pointed out that the recently developed
conductive thread by Sparkfun has less of those problems and can be used in
knitting and embroidery machines. So perhaps it’s just a question of time
before thread, fabric and e-textile application are ready for mass production
and consumption…

The question of
wearing wearables

So should companies
be interested in wearables? Is there a consumer market for electronic textile
products? Most applications that are being developed are aimed at medicine and
sports. Both markets have the human body at their core and are therefore the
first to benefit from and pick up on the advantages of textile electronics. But
is it also interesting for fashion for instance? Would you wear wearables? One
participant pointed out that she gladly would once she had gotten used to the
small annoyances that come with a new technology. She used the mobile phone as
an example of a technology that definitely has had its social awkward moments
but that seems to have settled in our culture. We will continue to develop
wearables and once products become production ready we will likely wear
wearables, and as for the question of why: perhaps just because we can. The
technology is out there.

The effect on
society

So what would a
textile-technologically enabled society look like? The central themes that
wearables raise are the questions of controlling and making decisions about personal
space, the bringing of the virtual into reality and the physicalizing of our
media. The different views on this subject made it clear that the technology
could go two ways. One participant foresaw a dystopia where emotional displays
on clothing would alter an atmosphere in a group so that the most negative
feeling would spread and take over the mood of a group. Anja, who created
E-pressed, sees wearables as enablers of a utopian world where we would take
our bodies more seriously, could interface our emotions and easily signal
others when we are stressed and in need of care. Stoffel talked about his
master’s research, the results of which supported Anja’s view. In his project
Stoffel used the heartbeat and galvanic skin response to measure if someone was
positively or negatively stressed. This bio information was fed back to the
participants through vibrations so that they would be aware of their emotional
state. Although participants were initially scared of the system and annoyed by
it, they reported that the system disappeared into the background when they started
using it. It turned out that the system was an effective derivative of the
participant’s emotional state. They performed a double blind test where they
let people do teambuilding exercises. Preliminary research indicated that teambuilding
goes much quicker with biofeedback because people notice how their system
reacts to others.

So how will
wearables find their way to the public?

An obvious first
big seller would perhaps be developed for the sex industry, which is notorious
for picking up new technology and giving one product a competitive edge over
another (allegedly how that’s how VHS won over Betamax). And perhaps there is a
future for wearables in a continent with a growing need of medical care for the
elderly? We could use bio information and telecommunications to outsource our
care to countries where labor is cheap. Or let a cough be analyzed by a
machine. Another application would be in fabrics that don’t get dirty. One
participant has already seen a presentation of a fabric that worked like a
lotus flower where dirt just rolls off.

Will our future
cross the boundary of the skin?

Inevitably a
discussion of wearable technology leads to the vision of a future in which we
not just wear our technology, but actually physically become our technology.
One participant called it a logical development. The rule of product design has
been that technology has become smaller and smaller and eventually it will be
so small to easily move beyond our skin. We can be scared of that idea but
already small invisible things communicate from our bodies and affect our daily
life. Hormones and pheromones strongly influence our interactions. We people
are nodes in a network and should stop being individuals. “If we chip our
animals, why not to our children” someone joked.

Lastly the question: why do you make wearables?

Among the various
responses from the participants were:

New fibers and new
inks are exciting, it is a very accessible medium because you can make things
without needing industrial machines, to extend the human body by copying nature
(bio mimicry), the desire to modernize textiles, to make beautiful
applications, to create a new impulse for the textiles industry, just because
electronics have their own aesthetics, for the love of interaction and
dynamics, the Frankensteinian primal emotion of wanting to create a kind of
life, to make things that are new, to push against the limits of known culture,
because of an interest in personal space and private space, for the love of
clothing and fabrics, because with wearables you can be different from other
people (the possibility of personalization and expressiveness when you wear the
same outfit), to extend the senses, because fashion is an interesting medium,
the pigheadedness in wanting to work with big companies, because it empowers,
to program things that you can see and touch, because it’s fun, because it’s a
super ancient female craft together with modern technology - a so-called
typical male skill, and surprisingly the most common one: because I like it as
an art medium and merging clothes and electronics just made a lot of sense
because of various things that came together in life.

The exploration of Shape Memory Alloy

The material Nitinol -a combination
of nickel and titanium- is a favorite among the participants of the Workspace
because of the potential of creating movement in fabrics without needing to
incorporate bulky motors. Only a few participants actually worked with the
material so Melissa prepared a demo to show how to electronically activate the
material. In the demo a transistor was used after the output to be able to
trigger a current that an Arduino cannot provide on its output. Although
electricity is used for the demo, it is actually the (resistive) heat that the
material responds to. A blow dryer could also be used effectively, but
obviously this limits the possibilities for interaction. For the fabric in the
video Melissa used a wire with a thickness of 0.015mm that has been trained
into a spring shape. Crimping beads were used to attach the SMA wire to the
electronic wire, as the SMA wire cannot be soldered. The wire has only a subtle
effect on most fabrics because it is not very strong. A thicker wire –needing
more power- would be able to create a larger effect. Possibilities for
different ways of sewing the wire and training the wire oneself are being
looked into.

]]>No publisherPiem WirtzThis information is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.DIYe-textile workspacetechnologywearables2010-02-03T16:20:00ZNews ItemHow to Present Wearables to an Audiencehttp://v2.nl/lab/blog/how-to-present-wearables-to-an-audience
Second E-Textile Workspace, November 26 2009, focused on the complexity of presenting wearables in sensible way to a broad audience.Follow all Workspace results at the E-Textile Workspace collection.

Main topics and structure of the session

The
second E-Textile workspace session took place on November 26 at the V2_Lab. In
the first part of the workspace a short introductionto V2_Lab’s current research in wearable
technology, by project manager Piem Wirtz,welcomed the participants. The introduction featured a small tour
of the working space, and a brief explanation of Intimacy, a project that V2_Lab has been developing over the past
five months in collaboration with Studio Roosegaarde and fashion designer
Maartje Dijkstra. While visiting the Lab space, participants could have a look
at both the design of the first prototype dress, and at the innovative material
used in the project.

A
consistent part of the Workspace was dedicated to the demonstration of participants’ own wearable projects. In fact, invited
once again to bring their own projects for hands-on work, some of the
participants held a brief demonstration for their colleagues. The informal short
demos featured current work by Meg Grant, Melissa Coleman, Anja Hertenberger and
Marina Toeters (see photo documentation).

The
workspace was then concluded by a debate
focused on the complexity of presenting wearables
in sensible way to a broad audience, a topic that had been touched already
in the first pilot session. The following questions were the kick-off for the
debate and were touched upon throughout the discussion:

For
whom is the experience? For the wearer, the audience or both?

How
to effectively convey to the audience the experiential, relational and participatory
aspect of a wearable project?

How
to put the focus on the conceptual and technological innovation of a wearable
project, and not only on its technological aspects?

Presenting
wearables: on the catwalk, in the ‘white cube’ or in the aRt&D
lab/institution?

What
are the current ‘trends’ in presenting wearables? What definition of wearables
do they (un)consciously put forward?

'Please don't touch' VS. 'please touch
(and interact)': can wearables fit into the traditional art museum, where the
art object is 'sacralised' and offered to the audience for pure
contemplation?

The
complexity of presenting
wearables to a broad audience

Forwhom is the experience that we aim to present? Is it for a single
individual? Or is it for a group of people? Who is the target of the
presentation: a large, general audience? Or is it a public of experts familiar
with technological research? How to keep things open and accessible for a broad
audience that can include both?

Participants pointed out several new questions and practical examples
throughout the debate, further proving the complexity of discussing and finding
effective strategies for display of wearable projects. These questions and
examples remarked that a standard strategy of display is nearly impossible to
apply to all wearable projects, and that traditional
exhibition modes often fall short when presenting wearables (the museum
setting, the White Cube of a gallery space, or a dance performance, for
instance). In fact, wearables feature several specific aspects that make them a
complex exhibition matter for public displays.

While most visual artefacts are somehow ‘made’ for public fruition (for
example a painting, a sculpture or an interactive media installation), the
fruition of a wearable project is, most of the time, a very personal and
intimate act, built around a single viewer/wearer (or a small group), and
around the act of wearing – by
definition an intimate and personal experience. Moreover, multiple layers of
meaning inform most wearable art projects: the artistic concept, technological
research and craftsmanship all play an important role for building up both the
final ‘object’ that shall be displayed, and the meaning that shall be conveyed
to audiences.

These different layers – the technology, the craftsmanship and the
concept – will emerge in different ways in a presentation setting according to the curatorial decisions and artist’s
choices, but also depending on the type
of audience that is experiencing the viewing/wearing. In fact, a public of
experts in the wearable field will certainly focus on different aspects, and
perceive the technology in a different way then a general audience composed by
non-experts. With the latter, it might even turn out that unveiling the
technology that makes a project function ruins the ‘magic’ and uncanny atmosphere
of a viewing/wearing experience – as it would happen if theatrical tricks get
revealed to us while we are watching a performance on stage!

Finding answers (and new
questions) through examples

Charlie, a project
recently developed by Melissa Coleman and demonstrated during this session of
the E-Textile workspace, is a good example of the complexity of presenting
wearables to a wide audience, as the participants pointed out. The project – a Burberry
trench coat that can read punch cards and make stories audible to the wearer –
can be fully experienced only individually, by having one person at the time
wearing the coat, listening to the stories and trying out the technology. This
builds a very intimate and personal experience for the wearer/viewer, which
cannot be effectively and fully conveyed by any other means then by letting the
audience try Charlie on, one at a
time. Moreover, the coat is beautifully crafted and the technology embedded
into the garment is the result of a longer research process – two layers that
are definitely worth showing in an exhibition setting.

Meg Grant’s demo further proved this complexity. In Meg’s project, the
technology is embedded into the garment with a beautiful finishing and the
textile is carefully crafted. Nonetheless, these details are only visible to
the wearer that opens the garment and tries it on. How to expose them to the attention
of the audience, together with both the technological research and the
interesting concept behind the project?

In Daan Roosegaarde’s Intimacy, on the other hand, a lot of
attention is focused on technological research, as the participants remarked:
the concept of the project is shaped around the innovative smart foil
researched by the artist and by the exploration of its possibilities. The very
specific context in which Studio Roosegaarde aims to place the project, the
fashion world, also determines the way Intimacy
will be presented to the public and the interaction scenario with the audience
– in fact, the project was presented on a catwalk and demonstrated by a
professional model.

Another good case-study, mentioned by the participants, is the exhibition
‘The Art of Fashion’ in the Boijmans Museum (Rotterdam), which featured several
wearable works by internationally renowned designers, presented in a
traditional art museum setting. In this example, the focus of the exhibition
was clearly the finishing and the technique of the textiles, and the
craftsmanship of the designers. Even the garments that featured technology were
presented in the tradition of the ‘please-do-not-touch’ art museum setting, and
only a video would show the functioning of these technologies to the public.

How to show the concept, the
craftsmanship and the technology at work in a wearable project, then?

How to effectively communicate the meaning while showing the beauty of
the object in a presentation setting? How to exhibit a personal experience of wearing within a public display? How to
present all the layers that inform a wearable project, and what to focus on
when planning a presentation setting? Answers and solutions vary depending on
the type of project and on the context in which it is created (is art, fashion
or design?), on the context in which the artist/designer aims to place the work
(is it a fashion show, a museum or an aRt&D demo?) and on the target
audience of the presentation (is it an audience composed by experts, by non
experts or is it a mixed, broad audience?). The different layers – the concept,
the artists’ craftsmanship and the technological research – will emerge in
different proportions, and be more or less highlighted, depending on these
variables.

Demo vs. performance

Two quite common ways of presenting wearables to audiences are demonstrations
in an aRt&D context, and performances. Dance performances in particular
often feature wearable technology. In both cases the technology is shown while
‘at work’ – and yet there is a quite substantial difference in the message that
is conveyed to the audience and in the layer that emerges with more strength in
each of these presentation modes. As participants noted, there is a shift in
focus from highlighting the concept of the wearable project itself and its
functioning – in the case of a demonstration – to using the technology and the
wearable as a tool for something else, in the case of a performance. In the latter,
in fact, audiences can certainly see the wearable and its technology ‘at work’,
but cannot fully experience it. Most attention is drawn towards the performers
and the concept of the performance itself, making the wearable almost secondary
and functional to a choreography and/or story.

Complex technologies vs. complex
concepts

An interesting point that got raised by the debate, and that influences
the presentation strategy of a wearable project, is the decision – by the
artist or by the curator – on how much attention has to be directed to the
functioning of the technology embedded in a wearable project. This can
implicitly decide if the focus of a presentation is on the concept and artistic
research behind a project, or if the main focus is to ‘make things work’ in the
best possible way. In an artistic context, the perfectly smooth functioning of
a technology is very important, but not fundamental nor the main point. As one
of the participants pointed out, a good story behind the project and good
documentation about the artistic process is, most of the times, the main
‘attention catcher’ for the audience, and is central to the success of a
project and its presentation. In a design and high-tech research context more
attention will be certainly devoted to the effective working of complex
technologies rather then on artistic concepts on how to use them.

Fashion looking at wearables
– wearables looking at fashion?

To conclude the debate, a few points were raised on the future
directions that wearable technology might take: art, research or design? From
soft interfaces to high-tech fashion garments, a whole range of possibilities
is open for the identity of e-textiles and their future use. Currently, the
contexts in which e-textiles are used are as varied: from special high-tech
sportswear to fashion, to art projects. As a participant remarked, the fashion
world will probably start to look more closely at what is happening within the
research on wearable technology and high-tech textiles, in order to find new
refreshing inspirations and new creative material for the fashion industry.